Have It Your Way, Burger King.

I evidently need the Christmas spirit.  

My excuse is I had a very busy and hectic week.  It included several airplane rides and visits to  four different states.  I probably should also say those visits included standing in front of relatively large groups of people talking about such things as  engaging people, investing in people and overall being a good person.  Anyway, I found myself driving late at night from the Atlanta airport to home.  I was tired and hungry.

Against my better judgement, I stopped at a run of the mill "Have it Your Way" Burger King.  

I was pleasantly surprised that there was no line in the drive-thru lane.  That would be the last of my pleasant thoughts.  I heard a  voice come through the speaker asking for my order.   I plainly said that I would like a Whopper with only Ketchup and Cheese, fries and a diet coke.  Not too difficult.  When she came back on the speaker incorrectly confirming my order,  I repeated again I only wanted Ketchup and cheese on the burger, fries and a diet coke.  As I stated my order again, she ordered me to drive around to the window.

Although I followed her orders, I was wondering where they find these people to interact with other people who are willingly spending money with them.  Surely there are congenial  folks out there who would like a job.  Anyway, she opened the window and told me what I owed.  I paid her and she handed me the bag and the drink.   Before I pulled away, I opened the bag to get the burger out so I could eat it as I drove the rest of the way home.  

The first thing I noticed was the burger was somewhere on the scale of  less than warm.  I opened the bun and noticed the tomatoes, onions, mayonnaise, pickles and whatever else you could possibly include on a burger.  I looked back at the window and the "lady" was nowhere to be seen.   I could see a guy working in the kitchen so I honked the horn.  Just for the record, I saw him glance at me but he was obviously pretending he did not see me. I honked the horn again.  

No response.

Getting angrier by the second, I knocked on the sliding window.  In fact I knocked a few times.  The "lady" who gave me my order had disappeared.

I had two choices at that point.  I could pull up to a parking spot, get out of my car and walk in the restaurant so they could get my order right.  Or I could just take the lukewarm burger with all the stuff I didn't want on it and deal with it.

Unfortunately, I chose neither of those two options.

I opened the burger up and methodically threw the tomatoes, lettuce & pickles (mixed with mayonnaise) at and on the sliding window. I did a fairly good job too.  Most of it stuck.  If I could have figured out how to stuff it all "where the sun don't shine," I would have done that.

I will admit I was looking in my rearview mirror for a blue light  the rest of the way home on I-75.   I'm sure they have video surveillance equipment and my tirade was captured for someone's viewing enjoyment - or maybe for evidence.  But as I thought further, that would really would be impossible because there was no one employed there who would have enough gumption to watch the video.

The good news is by the time I got home, I was laughing about it.  I told the entire story to my wife and she laughed hysterically - while I ate pimento cheese and crackers.

But you can have it your way, Burger King.  As a former POTUS once somewhat said, you won't have me to screw up my orders anymore.   I'm done.

Merry Christmas.